Repression in Palestine
The history of the freedom movement in India is repeating itself in Palestine. The constitutional struggle of the Arabs for the integrity and freedom of their homeland having failed, the Arabs resorted to a campaign of terrorism, leading to the assassination of two Britishers. Terrorism has now been followed on the official side by a campaign of repression. The leaders of the freedom movement have been hunted down, arrested and deported, The Grand Mufti, Al Haj Amin-ul-Husaini has taken shelter in the Mosque of Omar. The vicious circle with which people in India are so familiar has thus started in far-off Palestine. A vicious circle it undoubtedly is for if the lesson of the recent freedom struggle in India has not been lost on Britain, it should be able to foresee that repression would only intensify the forces of terrorism.
Needless to say, this is all very deplorable and if it shows anything beyond a shadow of doubt it is bankruptcy of British statesmanship. The modern British statesman must be hopelessly muddle-headed if he thinks that repression can kill a freedom movement. British experiment in India itself should have warned it against any such delusion. The prisoners of yesterday are the rulers of seven provinces today. To repeat the same thing over again in Palestine betrays a lamentable lack of imagination. The very Grand Mufti who has been forced to seek an asylum in the sanctuary of a mosque may have to be implored, as were the Congress leaders here in India, to form the future government of Palestine.
This, however, is but a minor stupidity compared with the alienation of the sympathies of the entire world of Islam. Even in normal times, Britain can ill-afford to lose the sympathies of the Muslim peoples. In these times, however, when it is certainly placed in the most critical international circumstances, such a risk borders almost on madness.
The Palestine question is no mere political question. It involves the most cherished religious sentiments of the Musalmans all the world over. That the British Government should ignore this aspect of the question is rather strange. The other day it yielded to the agitation of the Hindus against the abattoir scheme, because it offended against the religious sentiments of the Hindus. How can it afford to trample upon the most sacred sentiment of millions of Muslmans with regard to the holy land of Islam?
After all who is to blame for the situation in Palestine. The official communique of the Palestine Government lays the responsibility at the door of the leaders who have been arrested and deported.These leaders, the world is told, are “morally” responsible for the outbreak of terrorism. The irony of the assertion must be plain to anyone who knows anything about the Palestine question. During the Great War, when Britain found itself in deep waters, it held out lavish promises of freedom to the Arabs. When the War was over those promises were thrown to the winds and the Arabs homes were made a pawn in imperialist game. This clandestine affair should bring a blush to anyone with a conscience. But not only is the blush not there, we are brazenly told that the moral responsibility lies with the Arab leaders! The fact is the entire responsibility, moral as well as political, lies with the mandatory Power which has gone back upon its solemnly pledged word.
We are afraid the repression is bound to have very grave repercussions on Muslim India and the sooner it is give up the better for all concerned, especially for the British Government. To flout Muslim opinion on a question involving deep religious sentiment is the height of unwisdom. In fact, it is sheer madness. Let us hope better counsels may yet prevail and this mad policy may be abandoned.
(Printed and Edited by M. Y. Khan at the Ripon Printing Press, Bull Road, Lahore and Published by him from The Light Office, Ahmadiyya Buildings, Lahore. October 8, 1937)
